Generally, in a silver halide color photographic light-sensitive material, a color developing agent oxidized by an exposed silver halide reacts with a dye-forming coupler to form a dye.
The formed dye is strongly demanded to have a sharp absorption spectrum for good color reproduction.
Phenol compounds or naphthol compounds have conventionally been used as cyan couplers.
These compounds are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,369,929 and 2,474,293. The absorption spectrums of cyan dye images obtained from these phenol and naphthol compounds are not so sharp in a shorter wavelength region.
Japanese Patent publication Open to Public Inspection (hereinafter referred to as Japanese Patent O.P.I. Publication) Nos. 226653/1988 and 158441/1989 disclose imidazole couplers, which are described as having good spectral absorption characteristics. However, dye images obtained from these couplers have serious problems in light fastness and color recoverability when processed in a repeatedly used bleacher or a bleach-fixer.